Do you ever feel uninspired by what you are capturing or creating? Feel like your creativity just took a nose dive? One of my favourite things to do when this happens is turn to nature. There are so many studies that indicate spending time in nature increases your creativity and problem solving skills (Google it!).

Go for a walk, and just shut off your brain for a while. Let your senses take over. Watch the light and shadows, colours, shapes and textures. You might see an interesting flower or leaf, a gorgeous sunrise or sunset, beautifully shaped clouds, or a breathtaking landscape. Sometimes a little fresh air is all you need. If you happen to own a macro lens, even more minute details could be captured. Now when I go out to explore nature, I usually bring my two little sidekicks. I also make sure I am equipped with my little water bottle. With this, I can create water droplets on my subjects if I feel inclined to do so.

Try Planting your own mini garden or terrarium! Even blades of grass in your own back yard can be interestingly beautiful to document.

I live in Northern Alberta. Our winters are long and cold. I find this is the time I get into a bit of a creative rut and long for warmer weather with gorgeous golden hour light. Even when it is -40 degrees Celsius outside, I do not let that stop me. I will go to a local grocery store and buy cheap flowers to capture the shapes, lines and textures in different light all in the comfort of my cozy warm house. All I need is a little bit of window light!
The next few images all I did was was find some interesting cheap flowers, and used my kitchen window light.

In the winter months, I also love the challenge of trying to capture a snowflake (I am still working on this!). Take the opportunity to learn and practice image stacking. In the next two images I set up the tripod, then I threw one of my children’s hats on my deck to catch some flakes.

If you’re lucky enough to have a local green house, this can be an amazing backdrop for some images, as well as an opportunity to capture some beautiful details.

Go on a day trip, take in your surroundings. You’ll be surprised at how easy it is to discover some gorgeous new landscapes to capture.

Make sure you try watching the weather, go photograph the sky. Clouds are so interesting to photograph. Remember when you were a kid? When you would lie in the grass and gaze up at the clouds for hours? Try that again, but bring your camera!